A few days ago, I received an email composed of this simple sentence:
July 25, 1944.
On this date, 70 years ago, having declared my opposition to all wars, I was inducted into Civilian Public Service Camp No. 46 at Big Flats, N.Y.
It came from William Shank, who spent about six months with the Fine Arts at Waldport during 1945. Bill was a friend of Kenneth Patchen, and helped the poet to connect with the Untide Press, which eventually published his visually intriguing An Astonished Eye Looks Out of the Air. Does the cover design remind you of anything you’ve seen elsewhere—maybe in a famous little booklet published a decade after this one?